Interesting books, and news items about books and periodicals, particularly with respect to political and social issues. Since May, 2016, many of my larger book reviews have been put on a hosted Wordpress site; so now this blog emphasizes previews, interviews with authors, booklets, large periodical articles, and literary business issues. Note: no one pays me for these reviews; they are not "endorsements"!

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

"The Story of Jesus" from NatGeo and Time

National Geographic and Time have produced a coffee table paperback for Easter, “The Story of Jesus”, edited by Bridget English Hamilton, 112 pages, very heavily illustrated photographs, maps, and realistic drawings of the people. Jesus is drawn as handsome, bearded, and white, and looking about 35. Christianity does not object to drawings or images of Christ (it does not consider merely creating an image as “idol worship”) but some people feel that most images of Jesus conform to cultural (and racial) stereotypes about what is “desirable” to see in young adult males.

I’ll backtrack and mention that, back in the 1950s, in Sunday School we often had four story books (from the Judson Press) a year, color coded. In Fall, the book had a red cover, and covered the entire Old Testament, ending with the Christmas story. In Winter (through March), the cover was blue and covered the life of Jesus, up to the Passion and Crucifixion and Resurrection. In Spring, the cover was green and started with the Ascension or Pentecost and continued through the Acts. Summer was orange and covered a bit of everything (except baseball, maybe). Many churches over the years would follow a pattern of liturgical colors throughout the year.

This book is pretty straightforward but detailed, covering a lot of sensitive points (like the legal basis for the trial of Jesus before Pilate). The authors seem to like the book of Mark the most, but mention the apocrypha and various gospels not part of the standard Bible (but generally most of them have become the subjects of cable movies by now).

There are two particularly amazing things that I would have noticed had I lived then. Had I been “called”, I would have “worshiped” Jesus through a process psychologists call “upward affiliation” (which, unchecked, can skirt the dangers of idolatry). Yet, I would have found it hard to become “fishers of men”. I would rather win arguments than win converts, as a lot of people who know me will attest.

The other thing would have been that, besides witnessing miracles (and I think I have witnessed two in my own lifetime – in 1979 and 2012, and will not be more specific), being there for the Resurrection and Ascension would have “settled things” as for as the need for Truth about the Universe. Today, we have relativity, quantum theory, and cosmology. I think this all reconciles. I think physics demands that consciousness persists after “death”, when, right now, we find out “what is really out there.” Future generations may have the chance to learn this while living. Perhaps there will be (another) interaction with “aliens” who turn out to be “angels”.

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Since the 1990s I have been very involved with fighting the military "don't ask don't tell" policy for gays in the military, and with First Amendment issues. Best contact is 571-334-6107 (legitimate calls; messages can be left; if not picked up retry; I don't answer when driving) Three other url's: doaskdotell.com, billboushka.com johnwboushka.com Links to my URLs are provided for legitimate content and user navigation purposes only.
My legal name is "John William Boushka" or "John W. Boushka"; my parents gave me the nickname of "Bill" based on my middle name, and this is how I am generally greeted. This is also the name for my book authorship. On the Web, you can find me as both "Bill Boushka" and "John W. Boushka"; this has been the case since the late 1990s. Sometimes I can be located as "John Boushka" without the "W." That's the identity my parents dealt me in 1943!

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